Door banking



Nov. 9, 1954 R. MATHEWS DOOR BANKING 3 Sheets-Sheet 2 Filed April 26 1950 Nov. 9, 1954 D. R. MATHEWS DOOR BANKING 3 Sheets-Sheet 3 Filed April 26 1950 INVENTOR Donald 1?. M @515. eWo.

ATTORNEYS" United States noon BANKING Donald- R; Mathews,- Norristowm Pat, assignor to Wood Sheet-Company; Conshohocken, Pa -a corpora tion of Pennsylvania Application A riiizt', i950, stratus. tsetse 4* claims; or; air-2s) The" present invention relates to banking of doors in open hearth steel furnaces and other metallurgical furnaces.

A purpose of the invention is to cut down the time of opening'ofthe doors in an openhearth steer furnace incident to door banking.

A further purpose is to shorten the total eiapse'd time required for door banking. M

A further purpose is to reduce" the amount of labor involved in banking of doors.

A further purpose is to secure more reliable position; ing of the door banking charge" and" to ayoid haphazard placement of door banking;

A further purpose is tocarry the door banking-char e bodily into the furnace above the door sill andto dump the charge by the action ofthe door against'the charg= ing box so as to assure accurate positioning of the door banking.

Further pur'poses appear in the specification and in the claims; I v A p The present application is concerned both with the process and the apparatus for door ban-king.

In the drawings have chosen to illustrate one only of the numerous embodimentsin which; my inventionrh-ay ap'pear, selecting the form" shown from the standpoints of convenience in illustration, satisfactory opera tion and clear demonstration of the principles involved; Figure 1 is a diagrammatic s'ideelevationflof a charge ing machine on which" the door banking charging box of the invention has been applied.

Figure 2 is a perspective of the charging box of the invention with the chute in closed position. v v

Figure 3- is a plan of the charging box of the inven-- tion, sectioning away part of the latch and part of the box corner to show the construction.

Figure 4- is a partly broken rear elevation oi? the charging'box oftnei-nvemion V Figure 5 isasection of Figure 4 along the line 5- 5;

Figures 6, 7 and Bare fragmentar diagrammatiesid elevations of the charging machine and charging box showing the procedure followed in door banking in accordance with'the invention;

In the drawings like numerals refer to like parts.

, In the present practice of operating open hearth steelfur'naces, it is common to charge a comparatively large amount of scrap and then pour in enough hotflinetal to fillthe furnace above the sill plate level of the" doors. Iii-order to charge the scrap itis necessary to have the full opening of the doors available to insert the charging box, so that thedoors cannot be permanently banked; but when the hot metal is-added it becomes necessary to raise the effective sill plate level of the doors by adding refractory material in the form of door banking inside the doors.

The door banking may suitably be raw or burned dolomite, although it could of course be magnesia, chromite or other suitable refractory.

The practice has usually been to introduce the door banking by hand shovelling. This consumes consider-" able labor and requires that the furnace be held for about 40 minutes with one or more doors open, thus los ing heat and slowing up the operation. An alternate procedure has been to introduce the door banking through a dolomite gun which projects the refractory against a baflie held at the desired position inside the door to intercept the stream from the gun and cause it to fall in a heap inside the door.

Patent 0 2,693,888 Patented New 9;, 1954 The present invention is designed to. introduce. the door banking by the usual charging machine. The doorbanking'is applied by holding each door fully open for about- 1 minute. The" total time of door banking afurnace is. cut to about /8 that of previous practice, The. charging boxes for door banking. can be filled at any conveni'enr' time in the cycle when labor is most available.

Any conventional furnace charging machine can beused,. that shown in Figure 1 comprising a bridge 20 traveliing on rails 21 and supporting a carriage 22 which mounts a peel housing 23 pivotal about a pivot 21 as Well kfiownand adapted to move apeel 25 into and away from the furnace, up and down and also in rotation as well known. V

The pool is connected with a-chargingbox 2'6 espe cially' adapted to introduce the door banking.

The box is provided with a head 27 of any suitable character adapted to interlock with the end of the peel,- the head suitably having a' slot2'8 and openings 30 and 31- for locking the peel as well known. Thepartieular structure of the peel is not important to the present invention, except that it must cooperate with the particular' head. I p

I The charging box also comprises front. and back walls- 32 and 33, the back wall being interconnected to the head by brackets 34 desirably attached by welding. The frontand back Walls are interconnected by end walls 35' and 36' suitably secured to the front and back walls as by welding. y

Near the middle, the box construction is stiffened internally by bars 37 and 38 secured as by welding to thefront and back walls and extending across the box preferably at a p'o'sitio'n about halfway between the topandbottom. The bars 37 and 38 arespaced to provide a' slot between them. i

A bottom 40' extending across the box is provided with auxiliary ends 41 and 42 outside the end walls and adapted to form, with the bottom, a chute in open position. The auxiliary end walls are desirably triangular and" are suitably welded to the bottom wall. A p'iv'ot shaft 43 extends along the side of the b'ox a'djoining the head near the bottom through openings 44 in the end walls and is secured to the auxiliary end Walls to permit tripping of the.bottorn. The rear and end walls are chamfered at 33' at the bottom to allow space for the bottom to open behind the pivot. y p v A generally Z-sha'pe'd latch 45 is provided which is pivoted atone end by a pin 4'6 extending through pivot brackets 4'7 secured to the inside of the bottofii at a position opposite the space between the bars-37 amiss and intermediate between the front andback of the box. On the forward side of the latch, a latching recess or notch 48 is provided at a position opposite the bars when the bottom is closed and the latching recess engages around a keeper 50, suitably a rod extending. across the bars 37 and 38and securedjthereto as by'w'elding. Above the latching recess in upright" position, the latch carries stops St: at either side which in open osition of the bottom engage the top of the bars and prevent the bottom from opening beyond the inclined position shown dot-and-dash lines in Figure 5. The latch has a web 52 which extends generally transversely or rearwardi to the latching portion and has at the end of the web an upstanding tripping extension 53 which serves to engage the furnace door for tripping purposes.

In the open position, the tripping extension 53 extends into a notch 54 in the top of the back wall of the charging box, thus suitably retracting to a position largely below the door of the furnace.

The weight of the web 52 and the tripping extension 53 is suflicient to overbalance the latch toward latching position when the charging box is inverted. Thus when the box is inverted as shown in Figure 8, the bottom and auxiliary side walls return to their closed position due to their own weight and the latch returns to latching position due to the overbalancing effect of the web 52 and the tripping extension 53. When the charging box is positioned right side up, the latch remains in latching position due to the pull of the bottom and auxiliary ends against the latch engaging the latching face 48' against the keeper 50.

In operation, the box can be released from the peel in the usual manner by withdrawing the locking projection from the opening in the head and lifting the peel out of the charging box slot as well known. The box can then be stored as desired, and if stored upright can be charged while in storage position. When it is desired to pick up the box, the peel is inserted into the slot of the head as well known in charging box practice and the peel is locked by inserting the locking projection in the opening of the head. The charging box can then be raised, lowered, moved forward or backward and inverted by the charging machine manipulating the peel as in usual practice.

Normally the box is charged as by hand shovelling a charge 55 of suitable refractory door banking, and then is moved forward in upright position and desirably slightly downwardly to pass under open door 56 of open hearth furnace 57 and above sill plate 58 of the door (Figures 6 and 7). The direction of movement inwardly is suggested by arrow 60 in Figure 6. As the box moves it is manipulated so that it travels beneath the door, and so that the tripping abutment 53 strikes the lower outer corner of door 56, tripping the chute bottom and discharging the refractory in a pile 55' of door banking. It will be noted in Figure '7 that the position of the tripping abutment 53 in the release position of the chute limits the inward motion of the charging box and automatically predetermines the position of the chute so that the door banking is placed accurately at the correct position. If the charging box is substantially as wide as the door opening, a single charge of door banking will adequately bank an individual door in normal banking practice.

The angle of the bottom of the chute in Figure 7 is well beyond the angle of repose of the material so that the material will discharge readily without shaking or pushing. An angle with the horizontal between 20 and 45 is satisfactory for the chute bottom.

The charging box is then desirably withdrawn in upright position as shown in Figure 7, after which the furnace door can be immediately closed.

During the withdrawal, as shown in Figure 8 by arrow 61, the charging box is desirably inverted to restore the chute to the closed position and to restore the latch to latching position by virtue of the self-latching action exerted by the weight of the web 52 and the tripping extension 53.

It will be understood that abutments 51 extend slightly above the top of the box when the box is advancing into the furnace as in Figure 6 and that web 45 also extends diagonally upward, and if the box is positioned relatively too high to permit first contact of tripping extension 53 with the door, the door will contact abutments 51 or web 52 and trip the chute bottom, and later will contact tripping extension 53 and limit further movement of the charging box into the furnace by the contact with tripping extension 53.

While the invention finds its best application in open hearth steel furnaces, it can be used in metallurgical reverberatory furnaces of other types.

In view of my invention and disclosure variations and modifications to meet individual whim or particular need will doubtless become evident to others skilled in the art, to obtain all or part of the benefits of my invention Without copying the process and structure shown and I, therefore, claim all such insofar as they fall within the reasonable spirit and scope of my claims.

Having thus described my invention, what I claim as new and desire to secure by Letters Patent is:

1. In a charging box, a head adapted to be engaged by a sill, side and end walls interrelated and interconnected to the head, a bottom wall pivotally connected to the box on the side toward the head, a bar extending across the box in the forwardly and backwardly direction, a keeper on the bar and a Z-shaped latch pivotally connected to the bottom wall, having a forwardly extending latching recess which engages the keeper in closed position and having a tripping extension above the box for tripping the latch, the latch by reason of the Z-formation being overbalanced toward latching position when the box is inverted so that the bottom is self-latching on inverting the box.

2. In a charging box, a head adapted to be engaged by a sill, side and end walls interrelated and interconnected to the head, a bottom wall pivotally connected to the box on the side toward the head, a bar extending across the box in the forwardly and backwardly direction, a keeper on the bar, a Z-shaped latch pivotally connected to the bottom wall, having a forwardly extending latching recess which engages the keeper in closed position and having a tripping extension above the box for tripping the latch, the latch by reason of the Z-formation being overbalanced toward latching position when the box is inverted so that the bottom is self-latching on inverting the box, and a stop on the latch which engages the bar in open position of the bottom.

3. In a charging box, a head adapted to be engaged by a sill, side and end walls interrelated and interconnected to the head, a bottom wall pivotally connected to the box on the side toward the head, a bar extending across the box in the forwardly and backwardly direction, a keeper on the bar, a Z-shaped latch pivotally connected to the bottom wall, having a forwardly extending latching recess which engages the keeper in closed position and having a tripping extension above the box for tripping the latch, the latch by reason of the Z-formation being overbalanced toward latching position when the box is inverted so that the bottom is self-latching on inverting the box, a stop on the latch which engages the bar in open position of the bottom and auxiliary end walls on the bottom forming with the bottom a chute.

4. In a furnace charging box, a head adapted to be contacted by a peel, side and end walls interrelated to one another and connected to the head, a bottom wall closing the bottom of the box in closed position, pivotally interconnected with the box on the side toward the head, and swingable to an open position in which the bottom slopes forwardly and downwardly at an inclined angle from the head, stop means limiting the extent of opening of the bottom to the inclined position, end walls on the bottom which extend up to the end walls on the box in the inclined position and form a closed end construction on a chute formed by the bottom and the end walls on the bottom, and latch means interconnecting the bottom to the box, extending above the box, and released by the door of the furnace.

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS Number Name Date 421,797 Wellman Feb. 18, 1890 885,920 Goldey Apr. 28, 1908 989,444 Thomas Apr. 11, 1911 1,682,112 Brooke Aug. 28, 1928 2,119,424 Douglas May 31, 1938 2,347,899v Forsythe May 2, 1944 2,606,015 Brooke Aug. 5, 1952 

